UX UX UX UX StrategyStrategyStrategyStrategy

Using Design To Solve

Business Problems

@JimKalbach

Principal UX Designer Citrix

LIS Degree Rutgers University

Agenda

1:30 What Is Strategy?

2:00 Identifying the Elements of Strategy

3:00 Building UX Strategy

3:45 Break

4:00 Building UX Strategy (cont.)

4:45 Communicating Strategy & Planning

5:30 End

What is strategy?

What is strategy?

“A strategy is a set of hypotheses

about cause and effect….

and can be expressed by a

sequence of if-then statements.“

ROBERT KAPLAN& DAVIDNORTON,

"Linking the Balanced Scorecard to Strategy,“ 1996

“Air Sandwich“

At general management’s core is

strategy: defining a company’s

position, making trade-offs, and

forging fit among activities

…Strategy renders choices about

what not to do as important as

the choice about what to do. MICHAEL PORTER

“What is strategy,“ Harvard Business Review, 1996.

Hierarchy of Strategy

Corporate Strategy

Brand Strategy

ProductStrategy

UX Strategy

Strategy is…

… a hypothesis: IF > THEN

… about choice and trade-offs

… hierarchical

What isn′t strategy?

What Strategy Isn′t

Analysis

Budgeting

Resourcing

Project Planning

To make strategy more interesting — and different from a budget

—we need to break free of this obsession with planning. Strategy

is not planning — it is the making of an integrated set of choices.

Strategy is…

… a hypothesis: IF > THEN

… about choice and trade-offs

… hierarchical

… not analysis, budgeting, resourcing, or project planning

Strategy is a creative exercise to figure out how to winover time.

What is UX strategy?

Ripple Effect

An experience strategy is that collection of

activities that an organization chooses to

undertake to deliver a series of (positive,

exceptional) interactions which, when

taken together, constitute an (product or

service) offering that is superior in some

meaningful, hard-to-replicate way; that is

unique, distinct & distinguishable from

that available from a competitor.

STEVE BATY

http://johnnyholland.org/2009/06/what-is-an-experience-strategy/

UX Strategy Definition

Summary

• UX strategy is the set of choices to reach a desired position over time.

• Strategy is hierarchical, and UX strategy aligns upward.

• UX strategy is not budgeting, resourcing or project planning.

• You can NOT analyze your way to strategy; instead, it is a creative exercise to figure out how to win.

• UX strategy is about how design will help the business win in its strategy by providing value to customers in a uniquely meaningful way.

Elements of Strategy

Strategy Safari - 5 Ps

1. Pattern – Trends from the past

2. Position – Desired outcome

3. Perspective – Philosphy of working

4. Ploy – Out-maneuver opposing forces

5. Plan – Course of action

5 Strategy Questions – Roger Martin

1. What's your winning aspiration? The objective of your business

2. Where will you play? Where you do business: geographies, products, segments, channels, business models

3. How will you win? The value proposition and unique advantage

4. What capabilities must be in place? The activities & knowledge to reach objectives

5. What management systems are needed? How you know you have succeeded

LAFLEY & MARTIN MINTZBERG KEY STRATEGY QUESTIONS

Pattern 1. What trends motivate action?

Aspiration Position 2. What are your winning aspirations?

Playing field Perspective 3. Where will you play?Market, Customers, Region

Products, Platforms, Business Model

How to win Ploy 4. How will you win?

Capabilities Plan 5. What capabilities are needed?

Management 6. How will you measure success?

Elements of Strategy

IFT

HE

N

Aspiration

Playing FieldWinningPlay

Capabilities

Measurements

Trends

Exercise 1 – Identifying the Elements of Strategy

In groups

1. Take five minutes and read your scenario individually. Highlight elements that appear strategically relevant.

2. In a group, read your scenario aloud

3. Respond to each of the strategic questions on the worksheet based on the scenario.

Write down a few keywords for each that reflect a viable answer.

4. Skip elements that are unknown or make assumptions as needed.

Types of Business Growth

Ansoff Matrix

EXISTING NEW

EXISTING

NEW

Penetration Innovation

Expansion Diversification

Market

Offering

Building UX Strategy

LAFLEY & MARTIN

MINTZBERG KEY STRATEGY

QUESTIONS

UX STRATEGY

(KALBACH)

Pattern What trends motivate action?

1. Challenges

Aspiration Position What are your winningaspirations?

2a. Objectives2b. Desired UX

Playing field Perspective Where will you play?Market, Customers, Region

Products, Platforms, Business Model

3. Focus AreasUsers, Products, Geography, Areas

of UX, Aspects of Usability

How to win Ploy How will you win? 4. Approach

Capabilities Plan What capabilities are needed?

5. Activities

Management How do you measure success?

6. Measurements

Elements of UX Strategy

IFT

HE

N

1. Challenges

USERS

BUSINESS

Value

Business & UX Alignment Activities

JAMES KALBACH "Alignment Diagrams: Focusing the Business on Shared Value" Boxes and Arrows

Customer

Business

Touchpoints

Alignment Diagram: Experience Map

Service Blueprint

Mental Model Diagram

Challenges: Typical Patterns From Alignment Diagrams

Look for opportunities…

1. Efficiencies - “lean consumption”

2. Redundancies

3. Gaps

4. Barriers to consumption

5. User behaviors to impact or influence

6. Competition and disruption

JAMES P. WOMACK & DANIEL T. JONES "Lean Consumption" Harvard Business Review (2005)

Author Involvement Levels

Example: “Author Experience Map“

2a. ObjectivesHow does UX support the business goals?

• Increase revenue

• Decrease costs

• Strengthen brand image

• Improve customer loyalty

• Reach new customers

• Maximize visitor conversion

• Raise average order value

• Broaden market share

• Increase social responsibility

• Increase usage

• Save user‘s time

• Reduce chance of errors

Examples

From Gerry McGovern (http://www.customercarewords.com/strategy-and-online.html):

• Reduce phone and face-to-face support costs by 15% by increasing customers’ ability to complete their support tasks using online channels.

• Increase the conversion ratio from 30:1 to 28:1 by improving the ability of airline customers to see the costs of flights on days close to their preferred dates.

• Reduce repetitive, simple questions to doctors by 50% by allowing citizens to answer these questions themselves online.

• Increase the number of sales leads by 25% by asking the customer for as little personal information as possible when they seek to contact or otherwise engage with us.

• Make the purchasing process as convenient as possible for the customer by asking them for as little personal information as possible and asking for that information at the last possible point in the purchase process.

• Improve customer satisfaction and loyalty 5% by being the most transparent organization in the industry by using online channels, particularly social media ones.

• Increase your customer base by 10% every year by being the simplest to use and most convenient online service.

• Reduce time to market by six months for new products by actively engaging customers in the product development process.

• Reduce checkout times by allowing customers to scan products with their mobile phones as they do their shopping.

• Allow customers to save more money by using their mobile phone to scan an item and find out if there are any special coupons or discounts available to them.

• Allow customers to use their mobile phones as a shopping list that checks off as they scan and then reminds them if they have forgotten something.

• Allow customers to use their mobile phones as a budget planner, informing them how much they have spent so far this month as they shop.

• Allow customers to use their mobile phone to plan a healthy diet by reminding them to purchase a range of health products.

• Combine offline stores with the online shop to allow for faster and more convenient delivery of purchases.

2a. Objectives

Example:

• Deliver a high quality user experience that:

• Improves customer satisfaction by 25%

• Increases active usage by a factor of 2

• Drives preference: 90% of users select new solution

• Maintain UI consistency across products and services

• 80% of designs pass a “consistency check“

• Optimize and modernize our design processes

• Shorten design time by 25%

Don’t forget: Tie the objectives to the measurements.

2b. Desired UX -- Example

Key Principles – Familiar, Natural, Delightful

Make it immediately

understandable. I want to

just “get” it and know why

it’s valuable to me. I want to feel in control

of the software when I

use it.

Fit into my

workflow and way

of communicating.

Make it so natural

that I’ll just use it

all the time.

Make it delightful. I want

something that’s pleasing to the

eye and enjoyable to use.

Bring my existing

data with me so I

don’t have to

migrate and

commit to a new

system.

Integrate materials so that are

all close at hand. I need help

managing and organizing my

work.

Tie the desired UX to the measurements.

1. USERS

SegmentsNeeds, behaviorsWorkflowsSkill levels: average vs extreme users

2. GEOGRAPHY

CountriesLanguagesCultures

3. PRODUCTS

Websites, SoftwareDevices, HardwareTypes of UI

4. AREAS OF UX

IAIxDVisual DesignContent...

5. ASPECTS OF USABILITY

Effectiveness, efficiency, control, learnability, memorabilityAlso: Interruptibility, shareability, glanceability, findability, …

3. Focus Areas – Types

Picking focus areas is about making decisions on trade-offs in advance.

Strategy Canvas

Strategy Canvas

W. CHAN KIM & RENEE MAUBORGNE Blue Ocean Strategy (2005)

Example UX Strategy Canvas

4. Approach

What approaches, processes and/or principles will overcome the challenges to reach the desired outcome?

Examples:

• Mobile First

• Persuasive design

• Skeuomorphism

• The Long Wow

• ...

• Lean Startup

• “3-in-a-box” Development

• Paired Design

• …

4. Approach

BRANDON SCHAUER "The Long Wow" Adaptive Path Blog (2007)

The Long Wow

4 Example Design Approach (Migration Strategy)

5. Activities

Examples

• Competitor benchmarking

• User Research

• Card sorting

• Personas

• Design exploration

• Wireframing

• Prototyping

• Beta testing

• RITE testing

• Kano analysis

• Build > Measure > Learn

• Surveys

• Web Analytics

5. Activities

Activity Map

MICHAEL PORTER “What Is Strategy“ Harvard Business Review (1996)

IKEA Activity Map: UX Overlay

5. Activities

6. Measurements

How do you know the UX design was successful?

Qualitative

• User Research (tests, interviews, etc.)

• Inspection (heuristic review, checklist review, etc.)

Quantitative

• Surveys (questionnaire, SUMI, SUS, etc.)

• Metrics (conversion, funnels, analytics, etc.)

Benchmarking – Before-and-after comparisons

Triangulation – Combine measurement types

Tie measurements to the objectives and desired UX.

Exercise 2 – Building UX Strategy

In groups

1. Refer to the previous scenario and analysis of the business strategy

2. On the worksheet, record key points for each element of the UX strategy.

Write down a few keywords or phrase for each that reflect a viable approach.

3. Skip elements that are unknown or make assumptions as needed.

EXISTING NEW

EXISTING

NEW

Types of UX Strategy

Optimization(penetration)

Migration(innovation)

Adaptation(expansion)

Introduction(diversification)

Target Users

User Experience

Communicating Strategy

It’s a dirty little secret: Most executives cannot articulate the objective, scope, and advantage of their business in a simple statement. If they can’t, neither can anyone else.

DAVID J. COLLIS ANDMICHAEL G. RUKSTAD “Can You Say What Your Strategy Is?” (Harvard Business Review, 2008)

1. Documents

2. Diagrams

3. Strategic Conversations

Multiple forms and repetition are essential

Communicating Strategy

Start with a Strategy Statement in three sentences:

1. Change: What’s motivating you to change?

2. Gap: What‘s missing?

3. Resolution: What’s the strategic solution? How will youovercome the opposition.

1. Document Strategy

Business Example

Although ChemCo is well positioned in custom silicon, lower market prices from direct channels for non-custom products threaten our market share.

ChemCo’s current capabilities do not allow for direct sales and competing at lower prices.

To prevent disruption from smaller players, ChemCowill launch an online service under a new brand name, leveraging our deep technical knowledge to differentiateourselves in a rapidly changing field.

Strategy Statement -- Business

UX Design Example

After completing the new technical platform, the next challenge for The Opal Project is creating differentiated value for existing customers through a new user experience.

The current user interface for the core product, as well as customer support, however, both need significant overhaulingto meet the expectations of the current consumer market.

To deliver a world-class user experience and to integrateservices in a way that drives customer retention, the UX design team will create a program of incremental improvements to theproduct and service for ongoing customer delight.

Strategy Statement

Exercise 3 – Strategy Statement

In groups

1. Refer to the previous scenarios

2. In three sentences, form a mission statement following the scheme:1. Change 2. Gap 3. Resolution

Document your strategy:

• Strategy statement

• Elements of Strategy

• High-level Roadmap

• Team members, roles and responsibilities

UX Strategy Document

UX Strategy Canvas

2. Diagram

• Mix of stakeholders

• Planned exercises and activities

• Discussions and decisions

3. Strategic Conversations

• Define the purpose

• Engage multiple perspectives

• Frame the issues & choices

• Set the phyical environment

• Make it an experience

3. Strategic Converations

Planning

Prioritization

Effort

EASY

HARD

ImpactLOW HIGH

Do these first

Do these last Do these second

Do these third

River DiagramWhat is sequence of events that has to happen?

Not a project plan (yet)

Process

Swimlanes: How do the multiple dimensions of activity come together

Not a project plan (yet)

Project Canvas

DANKE SCHÖN

@JimKalbach

Jim.Kalbach@Gmail.com

www.experiencinginformation.com

Why do we need UX strategy?

“You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work backwards to the technology.”

STEVE JOBS (1997)

It’s a dirty little secret: Most executives cannot articulate the objective, scope, and advantage of their business in a simple statement. If they can’t, neither can anyone else.

DAVID J. COLLIS ANDMICHAEL G. RUKSTAD “Can You Say What Your Strategy Is?” (Harvard Business Review, 2008)

“Air Sandwich“ “An Air Sandwich is a strategy that

has a clear vision and future direction

on the top layer, day-to-day action on

the bottom, and virtually nothing in

the middle–no meaty key decisions

that connect the two layers.”

NILOFER MERCHANT

1. Fundamental shift in business

2. Companies not doing strategy anyway

3. You need to fight the “air sandwich“

UX Strategy Now